It was not until he was an adult and three other men who had also grown up in WA Christian Brother-run institutions confided in him about sexual abuse, did he realise that it may have been a "widespread problem".

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Mr McGregor told his story to the first Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse public hearings being conducted in Perth.

On Monday the hearing heard the story of the man who was born in England and taken to a place called Nazareth House in Aberdeen in 1941 as a two month old.

His maternal grandmother ordered he be taken there as he had been born out of wedlock and was therefore "an embarrassment".

Mr McGregor spent his first years there and he has few memories of the place other than the day a priest came to visit and children were asked if they would like to go to Australia where they were told there were "kangaroos and abundant fruit".

"Australia could've been a park across the road for all I knew," Mr McGregor said.

He put his hand up to go to Australia and arrived after a long sea journey in 1947.

A cycle of physical, psychological and sexual abuse started when he was just eight years old at Castledare.

It continued at Clontarf where his main alleged abuser was transferred to.

One particular brother, known as Brother Murphy, had what Mr McGregor referred to as a "group of boys who were his possessions".

He said the brother used words such as "disloyalty" and traitor" to instil a sense of loyalty and fear in these boys if they acted friendly with another brother.

"I would be woken up by him in the dead of night and he would whisper, 'Come to my room! I want you in my room right away.' Often hours afterwards, I would walk around the verandahs of the second storey at Clontarf, in the pitch-darkness of a cold winter morning, and would climb back into bed feeling bewildered and numb.

“I felt very alone," Mr McGregor said.

He described Brother Murphy as "very dominant and possessive, and had compete control of us".

After a period of depression or “nervous breakdown” at age 12 or 13 years, Mr McGregor said he "surrendered to God" and decided to become a Christian Brother.

He said he was "protected from the worst" after a stint in the infirmary because of his depression but the memories of the abuse kept returning especially once he had become a Christian Brother.

It was a conversation in 1965 at St Patrick's Primary School in Ballarat that the issue was brought to the surface.

At a lunchtime discussion with other brothers, Mr McGregor denounced sexual abuse of children, saying "there was nothing worse".

He was approached by some of the brothers following the lunch where he was told: "Bert the world is not a perfect place. Terrible things do happen and we must learn to forgive."

Mr McGregor stood his ground saying: "I sometimes wonder if there is forgiveness for child abusers. I would find it nearly impossible to forgive them, The wounds last a lifetime.

"Unbeknownst to me, I had revealed to those clever men the deeply buried hurt of my childhood," he said.

Mr McGregor claimed he'd been targeted ever since that discussion.

He said he was never posted back to Western Australia as had been earlier requested and said he said he was moved around without notice or explanation and often posted overseas.

In 1990 Mr McGregor returned to Aberdeen where his birth family were and he worked at a day centre dealing with homeless people, those with mental illness and drug issues.

By chance he met a man he had known as a child.

"He had been with me at Castledare and Clontarf and he returned to Scotland as a youth," he said.

"I had long talks with him, he told me of his abuse and how little support he was receiving. I was shocked by this.

"Up until this time I had carried my secret, thinking I was alone in my experience, now I had met another whose story was the same as mine.

"He suggested to me that the child abuse was extensive."

It was about the same time that his brother Alex, who he had not learnt of until he was an adult and who'd also been in Christian Brothers care in WA, spoke to him about of sexual abuse as a child.

"Another man also called into the day centre at Aberdeen and told the same story of abuse ... I knew him well as a boy. His story mirrored mine," Mr McGregor said.

"I had now met three children from my childhood who told the same story."

These conversations sparked something; Mr McGregor returned to WA and carried out what he called a "mini-survey" where he interviewed people who'd been in the care of Christian Brothers in Western Australia.

"Those who had been abused would raise the subject of abuse about one or two hours into the interview without prompting," he said.

"I felt that they were happy to talk confidently with one who should understand them, a fellow inmate and a brother.

"They then poured 40 years of their shame silence and anger over me.

"It was like they were saying 'Here is something I want you to take from me.

"There were tears, outbursts and wives sprang to comfort their husbands."

Mr McGregor said for some families it was the first they had learnt of the abuse of their loved one.

He recorded all of his conversations on tape.

He spent many late nights transcribing the interviews and has told the men he'd make a report of what he had learnt and he told them he would hand it to the brothers.

"Something will come if it, I assure you," he d tell them, confident that what he considered such strong cases would have to require action.

"The interviews confirmed that the abuse was widespread," Mr McGregor told the hearing.

He said he documented about 16 cases but, when the report was handed to the Christian Brothers in early 1993, it was not met in the manner he had hoped.

Mr McGregor was invited to lunch with a number of brothers and a representative he understood may have been a lawyer who told those at the lunch that "the reputation of the church has to be defended, the brothers have to be defended, the so-called paedophiles have to be protected from their lying accusers."

He said while some joined in with similar sentiments, no one at the lunch spoke up for the victims of abuse.

"By then I was convinced that sexual abuse was very common at Castledare and Clontarf. I was left with a dreadful moral dilemma - to decide whether my loyalties lay with my order or with my fellow victims."

Mr McGregor decided he could not ignore the issue that he had tried to raise.

"I felt that if I stayed silent it would put me on the side of those who cover up crimes and that I would be as guilty as the abusers."

He sent copies of the report to the Archbishop of Perth, the Superior General of the Christian Brothers, the Australian Minister for Immigration and the Premier of Western Australia.

Premier Carmen Lawrence was the only one to acknowledge receipt of the report with a "standard letter" and "expressions of concern".

Mr McGregor, who remained a brother, was then sent to Fiji in 1993 when further details of child abuse in WA within the Christian Brothers’ order were coming to light.

"I felt they had really reached the conclusion that the best place for me was in the third world," he said.

He returned to Australia after a couple of years and said he was made offers to leave the Order but would always refuse to sign the papers.

When he tried to find work he had difficulty doing so.

He was given a placement in a remote part of the Kimberley region but said he was never given any great responsibilities.

"I felt like the Christian Brothers never really owned the situation and they were not prepared to walk in my shoes as victims."

Despite not being able to gain the issue the attention Mr McGregor believes the issue deserves, he has not given in or stopped making noise.

"I kept my finger on the pulse of child abuse and wrote letters on occasions when I considered the church was not being fair to its victims."

His posting in the Kimberley was his last teaching position and he resigned in 2000.

"I still have a belief in God and I am so cemented to the church that physical separation is difficult," Mr McGregor told the hearing.

"However, it's impossible to be a brother because I would like to see the church reformed, and I feel that I have to side with the victims," he said.

"I thought I could create a life after my abuse, but the extent of the abuse being perpetrated by the Christian Brothers, and their reaction to my attempts to report it was what brought me down."

He said he now lives the life of a 'hermit" but feels that if coming out to tell his story helps just one victim "then it will have been worthwhile".

Public hearings will continue on Tuesday and are expected to run in Perth for two weeks.